17. Anouk #2
She staggers but doesn’t fall. Reaches for deeper, darker power—
Movement behind me. I sense it a heartbeat too late—one of Cordelia’s hidden agents, emerging from the crowd with a knife that glints with a poisoned edge.
Caius is faster.
He shifts mid-leap, wolf form crashing into the Preserver agent with the full force of his mass. The knife goes flying. The agent goes down beneath gray fur and very large teeth.
Torin follows a heartbeat later, bear roar shaking dust from the rafters. A second agent—the one who’d been edging toward Vera—finds herself pinned beneath a Kodiak paw the size of a dinner plate.
“Two down.” Elio’s voice is calm, almost bored. “One more somewhere.”
The Elder Council Chamber erupts into controlled chaos as the alphas engage Cordelia’s hidden supporters.
“Three of them total.” Rhodes is somehow taking notes while dodging magical crossfire. “I predicted four. This is actually fewer than expected.”
“Rhodes, this is hardly the time—” Aslan tackles the third Preserver agent trying to reach the doors. His tiger form is lethal in close quarters—all muscle and fury and very sharp claws.
“Documentation requires accuracy!”
Aslan pins the agent with casual brutality. “Third hostile neutralized.”
Despite everything—the battle, the danger, Cordelia’s magic still pressing against my shields—I feel my lips twitch. The alphas bicker even during combat. It’s almost comforting.
Cordelia uses the distraction. Dark power gathers around her hands, building toward a massive spell—magic I don’t recognize but can feel is devastating. The air itself seems to recoil from whatever she’s summoning.
I pour everything I have into my shields. It won’t be enough. She’s had decades to prepare for this moment, and I’ve had days.
The chamber doors slam open.
“That’s quite enough.”
Grandmother Peach stands in the entrance. Not with cobbler. Not with cryptic wisdom. With power that makes the air itself bow down.
Ancient magic. Older than the Severing. Older than the Preservers. Magic that remembers what the world was like before anyone thought to break it.
Cordelia freezes mid-cast. Not by choice—by force. Peach’s power wraps around her like chains of golden light, pinning her in place with the casual authority of a parent disciplining a misbehaving child.
“I’ve been preparing for this moment for a very long time.” Peach’s voice is different. Harder. The kindly grandmother stripped away to reveal power far older and far more dangerous. “The Preservers took what was precious from this world. It’s time to take it back.”
“You—” Cordelia strains against the bonds. “You’re the Guardian. The one who watches the ritual site. You’re supposed to protect the Severing, not—”
“I was never supposed to protect it.” Peach’s smile is knife-sharp. “I was supposed to guard it. To wait. To recognize when the magic was ready to heal itself and guide those determined enough to help it along.”
Her eyes find mine. Warmth flickers behind the ancient power—approval, perhaps. Pride.
“The old magic knows what it wants, dear. It just needed someone stubborn enough to listen.”
The aftermath is chaos, but the organized kind.
Rhodes is already muttering about structural damage, photographing a particularly impressive scorch mark. “Possibly eighteen pages for the assessment alone. The crack in the east wall is concerning.”
Aslan is helping subdue the last of Cordelia’s agents with more enthusiasm than strictly necessary. “Stay down. I mean it. If you try to escape again, I’m going to let Torin sit on you.”
“I would never sit on a prisoner,” Torin objects mildly, having shifted back to human form. “That would be undignified.”
“Undignified for who?”
“Everyone involved.”
Jasper is still hyperventilating about his ceremonial robes, which would be more convincing if they weren’t still smoldering slightly.
“The robe situation is temporary,” Torin assures him. “Possibly fixable.”
“It’s not fixable! This was hand-embroidered by my grandmother!”
“Then it has sentimental value. That’s nice.”
In the gallery, Sunny is distributing calming pastries she apparently brought in anticipation of exactly this kind of chaos. Biscuit the toad looks deeply unimpressed by the entire situation. Berry Thornwick is scribbling so fast her quill is smoking.
“This is going in the historical record,” she announces to no one in particular.
“You’re writing a book about this?” Vera sounds somewhere between horrified and impressed.
“I’m documenting events of significance. The bookshop has been very insistent.”
Caius finds me in the corner where I’ve retreated to catch my breath. He’s back in human form, a few scratches on his arms but otherwise unharmed. One of the scratches is dripping slightly—I make a mental note to tend to it later, when we’re not surrounded by witnesses.
His hands cup my face before I can speak, gray eyes scanning for injury.
“I’m fine.”
“You were magnificent.” He kisses my forehead, my cheek, the corner of my mouth. “Terrifying, but magnificent.”
“You shifted in the middle of a council chamber. That’s going to require paperwork.”